The cost of a ticket for certain parking violations in Jim Thorpe Borough could be on the rise as council considers updates to its fine amounts.

Police Chief Joe Schatz, during a council workshop Thursday night, said the increases under consideration are related to parking in a space that requires paying by text or at a kiosk, and anything under prohibited parking in the borough ordinance.

“In order to better align ourselves with what the county is doing, we’re looking at increasing the fine at a kiosked space from $20 to $30 and the prohibited parking fine from $30 to $50,” Schatz said. “We do see a fair number of prohibitive parking violations. For example, downtown you can’t park facing out. That’s a violation and the type of thing that would fall under prohibitive parking.”

Inspection stickers

Council discussed a new $50 fine on Thursday that would cover vehicles parked on borough roads without a valid inspection sticker. Currently, Jim Thorpe has an ordinance that prohibits a vehicle being parked on a borough street for more than 72 hours.

“Our parking enforcement staff does see a lot of vehicles parked on the streets with out of date stickers,” Schatz said. “Other boroughs and municipalities do have ordinances where those vehicles can be ticketed right away if they are spotted parked on our roads. Some of these stickers go back to 2022 and 2023.”

Council is expected to act on that ordinance at an upcoming voting meeting.

“It’s a safety issue if you’re driving a vehicle on a road and the vehicle has issues that won’t pass inspection,” Council President Greg Strubinger said.

Jaywalking

In another proposed ordinance, council is considering allowing fines for pedestrians who defy jaywalking guidelines in the borough.

“We don’t want to be out there being the jaywalking police, but there are times, especially during our busy events, where we tell people to stop and not cross the street here or cross the street there and they are just blatantly defiant,” Schatz said.

The borough’s ordinance, he added, may be crafted after similar ones in Allentown and Harrisburg.

“I know those are cities, but it gets like a city here when we have all of these people during busy events,” Schatz said. “Most of the people, when you say don’t cross there, they will follow direction, but some walk right by. If you’re going to be defiant, we need to make sure you learn that next time you come in the borough, you better follow directions.”